Send a text #012 -- In this episode - Post-Pandemic Resilience, Part 2- we'll be diving deeper in the theme of stability, beginning with the story of someone who had quite his share of troubles, but found a way through it! We'll then explore how to respond well to adversity so that we withstand it, recover from it, and move forward in life from it. Finally, I'll be sharing 4 practical ways on how to build resilience in your neighbours and among those in your sphere of influe...
Dec 22, 2022
26 min
Send a text #011 -- In this mini series, we first explore the changes in society due to the pandemic and its potential long-term impact. We look at what it means to be resilient in this kind of environment, the importance of relationship as we engage our neighbours, and how we can love-on people who have lost hope and are looking where to find stability in life.
Oct 27, 2022
21 min
Send a text #010 -- Inside the world of a bee's nest are a mass of hexagonal wax cells that together make up a honeycomb. The honeycomb acts both as a home for bees to raise their young, but also as storage for pollen and honey. And who is helping the bees to take care of themselves?... Well, that's the strategic role of the beekeeper! Yet who in our world is committed to doing that for the many families that are under huge pressures and growing numbers of children who are at risk? Adel...
Aug 11, 2022
47 min
Send a text #009 – In a recent Waterloo Regional Record article titled, "Affordable Housing Gives Vulnerable People an Opportunity to Thrive", author Leah Conner shares about her lived experience and the trauma of finding herself homeless as a young mom with 2 children. Eventually, she did became recipient of affordable housing -- a small townhouse in Waterloo. But she emphatically states that without it, "I wouldn’t be here writing this now. I would not have earned a master’s degree. My chil...
Dec 17, 2021
1 hr 2 min
Send a text #008 – 'HELP US BUILD ONTARIO’ - that's a banner headline from a recent full-page advertisement in the Toronto Star newspaper by the Carpenters’ District Council of Ontario. It points to the widening gap and growing crisis that is affecting not only Ontario, but trades all across Canada. Taking up the challenge to change the tide and seeking the Shalom– the total wellbeing of person, community, and nation – is this episode's guest Shawn Stuart, founder of Organized Kaos (a...
Nov 25, 2021
40 min
Send a text #007 – As the pandemic has swept across the world, governments, NGOs, faith communities, local citizens and many others have been engaged in supporting vulnerable populations effected by COVID-19. In the UK, the church has also been in the forefront seeking to do just that through their Love Your Neighbour initiative. Through Love Your Neighbour over 2300 churches and local organizations have partnered together to tackle the social consequences of COVID-19 to support v...
Oct 21, 2021
49 min
Send a text #006 – "Get out of the need-meeting business and get into the gift -finding business!" -- it's just one of the challenges that Lean-in's guest Jay Van Groningen brings to followers of Jesus, who want to make a difference where they live. Through his lens of asset-based community development, Jay helps us explore the role of church in the community ... one that is at its best when it embraces a culture of reciprocity, mutual engagement, and dignified inter-dependa...
Oct 14, 2021
49 min
Send a text #005 - Have you ever had the experience of feeling strong emotion because of the prospect of change? Perhaps deep down you love the way things are (see no need for change); you might have a strong attachment to a person, place, or thing, and scared about the possibility of losing it. In neighbourhood terms this is sometimes called NIMBYism (an acronym for Not In My Back Yard). Similarly, as followers of Jesus we can be resistant to intentionally engaging with our neighbours...
Sep 30, 2021
55 min
Send a text #004 - Few churches have the taken up the challenge of tackling systemic poverty at a community level like the Church of the Messiah on Detroit's East Side. Fearlessly and humbly, this church is seeking to do those 'greater things' Jesus talked about. Under the leadership of their pastor Barry Randolph, and with a clear vision from Father God, Church of the Messiah is focusing their efforts on community-based economic development. The result is that they are making a s...
Sep 16, 2021
48 min
Send a text #003 - Have you every found yourself disillusioned with the church, and wanting to throw in the towel? Well, my guest today has been there and knows that struggle. Jessica Ketola, is both pastor of the Practising Church in Shoreline, Washington, and a Parish Guide for the Parish Collective (Seattle) where she serves on the instructional team for learning communities that are reimagining missional innovation and church revitalization at the neighbourhood level. To...
Sep 16, 2021
43 min
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